Here Is How to Keep People From Tagging You in Twitter Photos

Twitter announced on Wednesday that it would allow users to tag other people in photos shared on the site. Here is how to prevent that.

"Photos Just Got More Social," Twitter announced in a blog post, all excited because: "Tagging people in a picture makes conversations around photos fun and easy." However: That is a lie. Tagging is now and will forever be obnoxious.

Tagging other people in photos is one of Facebook's worst features, a feature that all self-respecting people have shut down at some point. (Ideally, prior to being tagged in a photo taken on the far side of a bit too much alcohol.) Just because Twitter and Facebook are clearly in a deliberate race toward some sort of Platonic ideal of a photo-, update-, and ad-littered timeline does not mean that you must participate fully in that journey.

So here is our quick-and-easy guide to preventing your friends or your "friends" or — God, worst of all — your family from tagging you in Twitter pictures.

1. Go to Twitter.com.

2. Go to the little tools menu ("Settings and Help") in the upper-right corner.

3. Choose "Settings."

4. In the menu at left, choose "Security and privacy."

5. Under the "Privacy" header, click "Do not allow anyone to tag me in photos." By default, this is not selected, because Twitter wants you to tag each other so that you will come to Twitter to see what photo you were tagged in and then Twitter can show you an ad.